


Like a Bright Exhalation in the Evening, part 2

by raedbard



Series: Like a Bright Exhalation in the Evening [2]
Category: The West Wing
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-01-08
Updated: 2006-01-08
Packaged: 2017-10-06 23:13:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/58786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raedbard/pseuds/raedbard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which there is the loss of a fiancée and a wife, even more alcohol is consumed, desires are suppressed, and friends show their support.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like a Bright Exhalation in the Evening, part 2

**Author's Note:**

> This part is set pre-show, after the election and into the first year.

At the party afterwards, Toby dances with his wife. The guys organising the victory party have gone all out for the celebration - balloons in red, white and blue and a thousand banners proclaiming Bartlet for America fill the Headquarters. Three of the white balloons have fallen from their places at Andy's feet and Sam watches her kick them away with the side of her foot, then slip in her heels and fall against Toby, who puts both arms around her and hugs her close, setting her back on her feet. Sam can see that he's laughing, down into her red hair, which he touches with one hand - never stroking but only resting his palm there, a couple of moments at a time. Andy holds his face with both hands and kisses him, all tangled up in forearms and fingers, and the dark of her hair. Sam turns away from them.

He didn't have a date tonight, or anyone to bring to an event that had really started well before Super Tuesday. Lisa called that morning to wish him, and the Governor, luck, and then once more after the East Coast vote was almost all in to tell him that he obviously wasn't going to need it. He had hung up the phone knowing that she couldn't understand the buzz he had been getting from the campaign, and that she didn't care to. It was just politics, and who the hell cared? She'd asked him about Josh with an edge in her voice; asked if it was nice to see so much of a friend again, after all that time. Platitudes had fallen from his mouth with ease - we're all a team, we pull together, they're all remarkable people. He tells her one of Leo's stories about Abbey and the Governor and screws up the delivery because he's too anxious that she should laugh; he says he's sure she'd love CJ but not, of course, that he's less sure that CJ would love her. But he never says a word about Toby, and he's glad that now she won't be here with him tonight.

The night comes with a lot of dances. The guys were all rushed into suits, the women into pretty dresses and then in front of cameras, so the ballroom, though small, is full of sights to see. Mostly Sam is doing just that; watching, and drifting from handshake to handshake, with congratulations still coming thick and fast three hours in. CJ splits him off from his wanderings and makes him dance with her, though he's not at all sure he's an acceptable partner. Her dress - golden and beautiful, sparkling under the low lighting - emphasises the warmth of her body. Sam leans into it and wishes he could close his eyes.

"You okay there, Sam?" she asks, taking his hand and trying to twirl him, grinning.

"Yeah. I am ... I am."

"Convincing. Maybe needs a little work - "

"CJ."

"I was thinking you were a little ... I don't know, a little quiet, maybe a little down, even. For someone who will have his own West Wing office in a couple months, that is."

"I'm okay, CJ."

"Really? It's not, you know, because of Lisa?"

Sam smiles his best smile, "No, it's not."

"Because, I mean, if it was, you know you can talk to me about it. If you'd like."

"It was months ago, CJ, and months before that. We just didn't work out."

She looks at him for a moment, then nods. Sam knows she's unconvinced. "Okay," she says, then leans over and kisses his cheek.

He shrugs and smiles, unable to help it, then squeezes her hand. "Maybe I'm just thinking about the next four years."

CJ smiles back, and he knows her smile is nothing but genuine, then she pulls on his hand, "Come and get drunk with me and Josh."

He nods, "That sounds good."

In a corner of the tiny ballroom, surrounded by couples dancing and girls laughing and people Sam is sure he will never see again, he, Josh and CJ sit together, drink lukewarm punch and talk. Sam drifts in and out of the conversation, never really listening but comforted by the sound of their voices, and by the punch. It's disgusting - flavoured with entirely too many different kinds of fruit as well as the alcohol - but it comes in a punchbowl which he's sure is a half metre across. Sam sits near enough to it to re-fill his glass without getting up from his chair.

"It's kinda like those clubs you made with your friends as a kid," Josh says, sounding half way to the kind of inebriation which should rarely, if ever, come to him.

CJ manages to sound both sarcastic and indulgent when she says, "Only real."

"And salaried," Josh says. "A salary which, by the way, sees fit to apportion more money to me than to you. As well as a better title - Secretary just hasn't got any ... you know, any ... What's the word I'm after?"

"Tragic idiocy?"

"That's two words, CJ."

"I can shorten it to just the idiocy?"

"My job's better is what I'm saying."

"Yes, I cracked that ingenious code, thank you, Josh. You still get a crappy office."

"Why is it a crappy office?"

"I've heard tell, Joshua. I've heard tell of dark, dank corners far from the beauty and aroma of fresh roses which pervades, like the finest perfume, the abode of the Communications staff."

"It's the very best office, CJ."

"I think the very best office is probably the one with the round walls, Josh."

"Nah, s'weird in there."

"It's weird in the Oval?"

"Yeah, it's very ... disconcerting. Makes you wonder how they did it."

"With master craftsmen and a bunch of bricks."

"I think it's weird."

"When did you even go in there, Josh?"

"I've seen it on TV."

"Yes, indeed."

"Sam, back me up here - the Oval's a weird place, yes?"

"Sorry, what? I wasn't really listening." Sam says, not wholly truthful.

"Sam here is a part of our Communications family, Josh. He knows not of what you speak," CJ says, grinning and putting her hand over Sam's.

"Come January, we're settling this."

"Be sure you're the first through the door, Josh. After that guy in the Weird Room, of course."

"Oh, CJ, CJ. One day you will look back on this night and see how sad and wrong you were, and shall ever be."

CJ reaches over and slaps Josh with the back of her hand, "You're a little boy, Josh. Small and lowly, but the learning will come."

"Does it have to come with violence?"

"Always."

"It's CJ's special brand of affection," Sam says, and earns himself a slap of his own. He shrugs at Josh, "See?"

"I think the distance between me and CJ the Barbarian, scourge of Bullpen and Briefing Room, is probably enough to make up for my office. Have you got anyone who can check you over for bruises, Sam?"

Sam laughs, a little, "No, actually."

He watches Josh's face fall, then smiles at him. "It's okay, CJ's already done the sympathy thing."

"So, have you had anyone check you for bruises?" Josh says, his smile strained to tenderness.

"I'm fine, Josh."

"If you, you know, need to talk?"

"Yeah."

Their sympathy comes with alcohol, and when they've exhausted the punch, Josh and CJ take him over to the bar and start him afresh on the beer. CJ forbids Josh from drinking anything but OJ and orders herself something that looks appalling enough to be called a Grasshopper, but isn't. Sam drinks everything she hands him and listens to her best ' why Hollywood sucks' stories for the third or even fourth time, but laughs all the same because CJ delivers her punchlines better than he ever could. Her hand keeps coming back to his shoulder, as gentle strikes and pats, and the warmth of her palm through his shirt. He would, were he more sober, tell her again that he's okay, that he doesn't need them to care this much but the alcohol stops up his words, and he's drunk enough now that he doesn't know whether those words would be truth or lies.

Eventually, CJ says, "Where's Toby?"

"He's dancing with Andy, isn't he?" Josh says, tapping his finger against his glass and sounding unhappy with his increasing sobriety.

"He's still dancing? It's - " CJ looks at her watch, "It's two in the morning."

"Well, they're very much in love, CJ."

"I'm sure they are, Josh, I just didn't think even Andy could possibly keep him on the dancefloor for four hours."

"It's all about her being a woman of average height, CJ. You wouldn't understand."

"Ha ha."

"Andy's taller than Toby," Sam says, to no-one in particular, running his finger around the rim of the glass of Jack he switched to on the last round.

CJ leans back in her seat, trying to find Toby and Andy in the crowd. "In heels, yes she is."

"Only by a fraction of an inch," Toby says, appearing from around the side of the bar and sitting down beside Sam. "And I made her take the heels off."

"Have you really been ... dancing all this time?" Josh asks.

"Does that surprise you?"

"A little," Josh says, trying to intercept the glass of bourbon that the bartender puts down in front of Toby. Toby, whose reactions are rather sharper, catches the glass from Josh's fingers and takes a sip.

"Is he past his limit?" he asks, turning to CJ.

"Way past. He thinks the Oval is a weird room."

"It is."

"Ah! See - Toby gets it. I knew you would, man."

"Shut up and drink your juice, Josh."

"So," CJ says, cutting off any attempt at protest coming from Josh, "We're getting Sam wasted instead."

"Okay, then."

Toby stays. Andy comes by to say goodnight and leaves him, with a smile and congratulations to all of them, then a quick kiss pressed into the line of Toby's beard. Sam watches his eyes follow her from the ballroom, dark and sober; wide open. He finds he can't say very much after that and he's glad when CJ buys him another refill.

Sam's not sure how it ended up being Toby who takes him home, checking his seat belt with his strong fingers and guiding up his steps with one hand pressed to the small of his back. It's the other reason they keep Josh sober, but Sam can't say that he's complaining, only that he wishes he'd been less drunk to begin with. Toby's hands are warmer than CJ's and they cut through the confusion in his head and bring him to temporary focus, bring him cold shock and shudder, bring his own hands tight together in his lap, and his head down low upon them.

"Sam?"

Toby's hand is on his back again, between his shoulder blades now and rubbing gently.

"Sam, I'm leaving some water here. Drink it all, okay?"

He can't take the right words out of his mouth, isn't sure that they wouldn't end up as the ones in his head, the ones he can't let Toby hear. So he nods, as best he can, and suppresses the urge to throw up.

What he thinks he might have dreamt only comes to him the next morning, but strong and with a shiver that Sam would love to take as a stamp of truth. He stands in the shower and runs the memory, or the dream, over and over, wondering. Sam knows the touch of Toby's hand well enough to have dreamt it to the back of his neck - slow and uncertain, fingers dancing - then soft and long into his hair, shifting through and stroking his skin. He decides on the dream, but can't figure why he didn't dream Toby's hands anywhere else.

 

2.

 

Toby sits at his desk and stares at his divorce papers. He knew what they were as soon as Ginger handed them to him, across the desk that he has now decided to call home. They come in a plain manilla envelope, thick and heavy in his hand, which he up-ends over the desk, spilling new paper over the sheets with which he is more familiar. Some of it is stapled, some of it bound, and Toby wouldn't be at all surprised to find that it has all been provided in triplicate. There are three pages telling him exactly what he should sign, as though the words 'spouse from which divorce is sought' weren't giving him enough of a clue. There is no note from Andy, and that is the smallest of mercies.

He finds he can't really move after he's signed in all the right places, next to the x. He sits and stares at his own signature, feeling too hot in the June sun, still and quiet, and lost.

Sam doesn't knock before he comes into the office; he never does, and the door's open anyway so Toby can't blame him. He knows it's Sam from the bright white that appears in his peripheral vision, bobbing just above his sight line and holding yet another piece of paper, just as white as his shirt.

"Toby?"

He can't answer, can't find even the smallest of words right now.

"Toby?"

He lifts his eyes up to Sam, and sighs. The air feels heavy coming from his mouth; dense and stale, and he knows the words will be that way too.

"Toby, are you alright?"

"Yeah."

"You sure?"

"Yes."

"What're you reading there?"

He takes a deep breath and meets Sam's eyes, "They're my divorce papers, Sam."

He doesn't want the sympathy that comes to Sam's eyes, the pain that arrives there - shining dark and sure - in all of a second. He tries to make his eyes say what the words won't; tries to make them dull and resigned - not in the mood to talk about it. But Sam comes in, and shuts the door behind him.

"Jesus, Toby ... Why didn't you say anything?"

His voice is so high with hurt and things unspoken; all the things Toby remembers but has hidden down so deep that they're all but gone from him. Toby watches Sam's body strain and straighten, setting himself, from the shoulders down, against this new thing.

"I didn't realise it was obligatory."

"Oh, Toby - come on."

"No, Sam. This isn't ... anyone's business. Okay?"

Sam's lips are parted, and that's where Toby stares, for a second - caught in slick blackness - until he raises his eyes, asking him not to say anymore. Sam is silent, just a moment too long, then he nods. He stretches out his hand, still holding the paper.

"Well, I brought you this. On the India thing."

"Okay."

Their fingers touch, side to side, as Toby fumbles for the piece of paper, but their eyes stay separated. Sam clears his throat.

"I'm sorry, Toby."

"Yeah."

"You want me to - ?" Sam tilts his head to the side, indicating the rest of the Bullpen.

"Nah, I'll tell them." Toby lifts his eyes to Sam's, bites his lower lip, "T-thank you."

Sam sighs, sounding very tired. Toby watches him squint from the sun that starts shining back in through the blinds, then he blinks; suddenly all light and cheer again.

"It's what friends are for," he says, then he turns on his heel and walks out.

Toby watches for the rest of the day, from his desk, buried in paper. He closes down to the whispers that he knows are passing through the Bullpen; Ginger and Bonnie, despite all his names for them, are not stupid, and they listen, as all good assistants do. But when CJ phones him the tone of her voice tells him that she doesn't know, and that Sam kept his word. He stays put anyway.

The sun has gone from the apartment by the time he gets home. Staying late at the office isn't a chore when you work for the President of the United States, or so Toby's been saying, to all those who'll listen and most who won't, these past months. Now that he has no-one to say it to and there's no-one to disagree with him, he believes it all the more. So Toby comes home at a quarter after nine and opens his door to darkness and cold air. The two remaining bags of Andy's things that he put out by the table at the door are still there, untouched. Toby lets his fingertips brush over them, then shoves them between the table legs with the side of his foot - she can come by and find them; he's done helping.

Keys go on the table, and he discards his own bag, already threatening to spill more paper across the floor, on the couch. Toby slips out of his jacket and throws that over the couch too, then reaches for his tie. The knot is too tight; tied in anger this morning, and now resisting his fingers at every pass, turning small and stubborn around his neck. He makes himself untie it before he reaches for the scotch, just in case it throttles him in the night.

He doesn't make it to bed but stretches out in the couch with the bottle and the briefing notes, and Sam's memo. The words show that he's training the kid well, or possibly that Sam is cribbing from him at every turn. Toby reads them through, his lips moving silently with the words, through Sam's clear syntax and into the things hidden between the lines. He takes his red pen from his shirt pocket and taps it, still capped, against the paper. For his life, he can't think of anything to correct, which worries him slightly but not enough for him to uncap the pen and manufacture some fault in Sam's writing to make himself feel better; the scotch does that just fine.

Eventually the darkness becomes oppressive, and he gets up - stretching his arms tight above his head and wishing he hadn't almost immediately - and switches on one of the many lamps which Andy has left about the place. There is one in every corner of the room, of varying heights and sizes, but all belonging to his wife and bearing her mark. Toby picks the one he knew she liked least and then realises, once he's back on the couch, that it shines direct into his eyes. He sits up and sighs, rubbing his hand over his eyes. He considers throwing something at the lamp but decides against it, knowing he wouldn't be able to summon the energy to clean up afterwards. So he rearranges himself on the couch and goes to sleep, trying not to think about the conversation he has to have with the President in the morning.

*

"So, we decided ... to get a divorce. I signed the papers yesterday."

"Toby," the President says, his voice soft and tender, "You should have told me."

"I didn't ... think it would be, ah, of interest to you, sir." Toby says, to the seal in the middle of the carpet; he can't look at the President's face.

"You know that's not true, Toby."

"I didn't want to ... bother you with this, sir."

"Toby - this is your marriage, your life! It's not the problem on your tax return you can't figure out by yourself!" The President's voice softens, slipping down and past Toby's defences, "You should have said something."

"Yes, sir."

The President steps closer to him, lays a warm hand on his arm, "You okay?"

"I'll be fine."

Bartlet nods, but the expression on his face says: you're full of crap. Then, "You told the others?"

"Sam knows. Not the rest of them."

"When they start offering you favours and drinks and generally being nice to you, Toby, don't be a horse's ass and throw it back in their faces, okay?"

"Yes, sir."

"Come and see me later; we'll play a little chess."

"Was that a test, Mr. President?"

"That all depends on how you answer me, skippy."

"I'd love to come and have you destroy my game, sir."

"That's right, Toby," Bartlet says, smiling for the first time in their conversation. "Off you go."

Toby lets his face soften, practising, and says, "Thank you, Mr. President."

"Thanks, Toby."

Later, CJ embraces him, smothering him in perfume and the warm press of her breasts to his chest. She kisses his cheek and whispers, "If you want to talk." He smiles and nods, unable to find any words for her, and feeling lost inside her sympathy. He makes sure, though it hardly matters anymore, not to let his eyes linger on her lips. Josh hugs him, quickly and full of self-consciousness, but his eyes - always transparent, always a moment from pain - let Toby know that his promise is the same as CJ's. He's just as grateful, but still can't summon the words to say so. Leo lays his small, gentle hand on his shoulder and says, "Things fall apart, man, I'm sorry." It's Leo who gets his hoarse words of thanks, stuttered and embarrassed and misdirected at the floor. When he raises his eyes, it's Sam he sees, staring at him. The sunlight is shining on to his face again, glancing off his glasses, and Toby finds that he is grateful for that too.


End file.
